The Human Slave Mated To The Alpha king

Chapter 7

I hadn't even had time to process anything when the door opened and a middle-aged woman walked in like she owned the air in the room.

"What are you doing on the floor. Get up. You've already dirtied it," she said, irritated, glancing down at the floor like I'd personally offended it.

I looked down too. The floor looked exactly as clean as it had five minutes ago. Cleaner than most floors I'd scrubbed in my life, actually. "What," I muttered, mostly to myself, too tired to argue the point out loud.

"Are you mute as well? Get up. Fast. You've got a lot of work ahead of you," she said, already turning for the door without waiting to see if I obeyed.

I scrambled up so fast my knees protested, and followed her out before she could decide I was too slow for that too. No guards in the hallway. Small mercy. I think I'm developing a genuine phobia of men in uniform at this point, the kind that makes your pulse spike before your brain's even caught up to why.

"Walk faster," she snapped, irritation climbing with every step, like my legs owed her something they hadn't yet paid.

"Ma'am, please..." I started, hurrying to catch up.

"It's Madam Voss," she cut in, not even slowing down, not even glancing back. Up close she had the kind of face that had probably been handsome once, before it hardened into something permanently unimpressed. She moved like a woman who'd spent decades making sure nobody mistook her for staff, not master, and had long since stopped caring whether people liked her for it.

"Madam Voss, please, where are we going?" I asked, half-jogging now just to stay level with her.

"Do I owe explanations to a slave now?" she asked, sneering back at me over her shoulder like the question itself had been an insult.

"No, Madam Voss." I dropped my eyes to the floor. Ten minutes ago I'd been ready to die on principle, mouthing off to the most feared man in the kingdom. Apparently the old manners came rushing back the second someone new showed up to enforce them. Funny how fast survival instinct overrides pride.

She led me across the grounds to a low building tucked behind the palace, plain stone, none of the carved doors or polished floors from where I'd just come from.

"This is the servants' quarters. You'll be staying with the omegas." Two young women appeared beside us almost on cue, like they'd been waiting just out of sight for their introduction. "This is Sable and Wren. They'll show you to your quarters, take you to the bathroom, and find you a change of clothes. You stink." She said it flatly, like she was reading off a weather report, not an insult.

I didn't need her to tell me that. I hadn't bathed in over five days, and I was fairly sure I could smell myself over the smell of blood and gravel and fear-sweat that had been building since the courtyard chase.

"Alright," I said.

"Girls, get to it," Madam Voss said to them.

"Yes, Madam Voss," they said in unison, bright and obedient, the kind of tone you use for someone whose opinion of you actually matters.

"And slave... meet me in the kitchen in twenty minutes." She was already turning away, already done with me, some other task pulling her attention before she'd even finished the sentence.

"Yes, Madam Voss."

"Come with us, slave," Sable said, not bothering to wait before walking off.

I followed them around the side of the servants' quarters to a well, my bare feet stinging against the cold stone path. Sable was tall, sharp featured, the kind of pretty that came with knowing it. Wren was smaller, quieter, but her eyes tracked me the whole way like she was cataloguing something.

"Take this. Fill it with water," Wren said, shoving an empty bucket into my hands without ceremony.

"Thanks," I said, and lowered it into the well, hauling it back up full, my arms already shaking from a day that had started with running for my life and hadn't slowed down since. "Where's the bathroom?"

They both burst out laughing, doubled over like I'd told the funniest joke either of them had heard all week, Sable actually wiping under her eye.

"Is she serious right now," Sable asked Wren, like I wasn't standing right there holding a full bucket.

"Did you actually think we'd share a bathroom with a slave?" Wren said, looking me over slow, head to foot, with open disgust, the amusement draining into something colder.

"Madam Voss said to take me there," I said, gripping the bucket handle a little tighter, water sloshing over the rim onto my feet. "If not the bathroom, then where?"

"Here," Sable said, gesturing at the open yard around us like it was obvious, like I was the slow one for not already understanding.

"Here... this is open ground. People walk through here." I didn't want to believe what I already knew was coming, my stomach sinking with the same slow dread I'd felt outside the king's door, my grip on the bucket the only thing keeping my hands from shaking visibly.

"That's exactly what we mean." Wren's smile went sharp, delighted, and she reached out and yanked at the collar of my dress, testing the fabric between two fingers like she was pricing livestock. "A slave like you doesn't get dignity."

I stepped back on instinct. Water sloshed over my feet, ice-cold against skin already numb from the well.

"Where do you think you're going," Sable said, and she wasn't laughing anymore either.